Kitchen Queries

Welcome to Kitchen Queries, where the nigella.com team will answer your cooking or food related questions. We’d love you to submit some of your recipe problems, dilemmas or queries for us to get our teeth into!

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Rocky Road Crumbling When Cut

I made Nigella's Christmas Rocky Road which was divine but many of the pieces were lost in crumbs as they did not keep together when I cut it into pieces. i'm not sure what I'm doing wrong. Any tips for it not to happen again?

Posted by HeleneBjorkstrom. Answered on 3rd Feb 2013 at 12.00

From the nigella team:

There are a few possible reasons why your Christmas Rocky Road crumbled when you cut it. Most likely it was just a bit too cold which will mean that it is very firm and, unless you have a super-sharp knife, it would crumble as you apply force on the knife you are cutting with. It may help to let the whole sheet of Rocky Road stand out of the fridge in a cool place for about an hour and then cut it. You can store the cut bars in an airtight container in the fridge.

It is also possible that the chocolate became a little too hot and siezed as you melted it. It would have turned slightly grainy and although it is possible to use the siezed chocolate in the bars it may have made them slightly more friable. Also make sure that the pieces of biscuit are not too large which could make it difficult to cut up the bars cleanly, but avoid crushing them completely to crumbs. Aim for pieces roughly the size of chocolate chips.